


Unknown Enemies

by JuweWright



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, HP: EWE, Other, Post-Hogwarts, St Mungo's Hospital
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-14
Updated: 2015-03-23
Packaged: 2018-03-17 19:20:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3541043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JuweWright/pseuds/JuweWright
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The wizarding community are faced with an unexpected threat. A curse that seems to spread like a disease only among wizards is taking its toll. Harry Potter and his Auror colleagues have to find the attacker before the "virus" wipes out the magic. At the same time, Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy, both working in St Mungo's Hospital try to find a cure for the curse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I have to say, this is another story that sprang from an idea on the FB Dramione board. People, stop throwing your ideas at me, I will end up with a dozen stories that need finishing! 
> 
> So. This starts off light hearted enough, but I swear to you, it's gonna become darker with time.

“Harry Potter, you must be kidding me!”

Ginny Weasley dropped a pile of dirty dishes in the sink with a whip of her wand. As she was in furious-Ginny mode, the whip ended up being a bit exaggerated and the plates dropped into the water, creating a muddy brown fountain that splashed down onto the kitchen floor. Ginny sighed and wiped the water up with another wave of her wand.

Harry leaned against the door frame and shook his head.

“I think it's a perfectly sensible idea.”

“Harry, sensibility just ran out of that door, packed its bags and left for Timbuktu. Seriously, I am very close to sending an owl to St Mungo's so they can check out what happened to your brain. I mean being an Auror you come across all kinds of curses. Are you sure you weren't hit by any weird spell lately?”

Harry decided it was safe to cover the distance between them to take her hands.

“Ginny, they have changed. Both of them. It's been almost ten years. They are colleagues. They work together. I haven't heard Hermione utter a single snide remark about him for ages. I have heard her tell people what a capable healer he is, though. And I saw them go for coffee together more than once. Why does the possibility of them becoming a couple throw you off that much?”

Ginny pushed his hair back with her left hand and kissed the scar on his forehead. It was only a slight touch of the lips but it reassured him that she was not really angry. Baffled, perhaps. But not angry.

“You really do believe in the good core of all people, Harry. After all the horrid things you've been through you still keep that faith. I don't know. Sometimes I get the feeling that I am the older one, because my cynicism can outrun yours even if it's drugged and drunk. They were mortal enemies. She's Muggle born. He's been brought up as one of the pure-blood sect. I am quite impressed they manage to work alongside each other without issues. But there's a big step from “not hating each other” to “falling for each other”. I would love Hermione to find someone smart and cool and lovely. Someone who can actually keep up with her – and this is me talking: I love Ron, because he's my brother, but he was never a match for Hermione. But believe me, Harry, this someone is not Draco Malfoy.”

Harry grinned and tried to catch a glimpse of what was baking in the oven over her shoulder. He was famished. There had been a few weird cases of misused magic in Kensington Park and he had only had time for a coffee in between interviews with witnesses and the necessary Obliviating. Why the Aurors were involved in this at all had escaped him until he had been asked to help escort the assaulted wizards to St. Mungo's hospital. The sight of their red-rimmed eyes, shaking limbs and incoherent speech had made him recoil. From what he and his colleagues gained from the interrogations, the oldest wizard – none other than Mundungus Fletcher – had cursed the two others and they had begun shouting names – most of them names of well-known wizard families, before they entered their current state. The weirdest thing about all of it was, that none of them had harmed any of the Muggles. There had been lots and lots of Muggles walking their dogs, running, enjoying the sunny day in the park. Harry left three sweating colleagues from the Obliviation Office behind and grabbed Mundungus' hands to side-by-side apparate to the hospital.

Hermione was on duty in the Emergency Department and had welcomed him with a big smile and a hug before tending to the three patients who had suddenly become more violent again, tried to grab hold of any wand they saw and shouted abuse at the people walking by. The conundrum had alarmed one of the other healers who had been tending to a nasty looking Werewolf bite on the leg of a pale teenage-boy who was clasping the hand of his mother.  
Harry had not realised who the second healer was, before the man had nonchalantly uttered a couple of spells which ended with the three rabid wizards lying in an unconscious pile on the floor, their hand and feet bound by pretty strong ropes.

“Hello Potter”, Draco Malfoy had said with a half-smile. “I see things haven't changed. You still bring trouble.”

They made a point out of being non-too-polite to each other whenever they met. It was a game. In a changed world, some fix points had to remain and one of them was that Malfoy and Potter did not get along. In reality, Harry sometimes looked back on his school days wondering why he had hated Malfoy so much. There had been enough other spoiled brats in his year. No need to focus all your negative energy on one single target.

“Hey Harry”, Hermione had chimed in, pushing her bushy hair back and throwing a questioning look at the wizard-pile on the floor, before conjuring up three berths and flipping her wand to have them shovel up the patients. 

“Thanks Draco”, she added with a smile at her colleague. 

“Always glad to have your back, Granger”, Draco grinned and went back to the werewolf bite. 

This had been the moment that an idea had dawned on Harry. He would never even have considered this was a possibility, but they seemed at ease around each other and the way Draco looked at Hermione was... caring? Harry was not sure. He had never seen Draco Malfoy care much for anything or anyone, so who was he to tell the expression on the man's face? But still. Hermione had been single ever since she had broken up with Ron which had been almost nine years ago. They had stayed together after the war, but the relationship had been doomed from the beginning. He suddenly noticed, Hermione was talking to him.

“Huh?”

“I could see you were somewhere else with your thoughts. Any idea what kind of spell caused these three to behave like they did right now?”

“I have no idea. It's really weird though. They seemed pretty tame when we picked them up. They did not attack any Muggles.”

Hermione shrugged.

“We will find out what happened to them. This is going to be a tough week though. We had three werewolf bites in the last couple of hours. Seems like there's a new born whom nobody has taken care of. And the dragon pox have become a major issue as well. I don't remember there ever being an epidemic like this.”

“Are you still in for Dinner on Saturday? Ginny is looking forward to catching up with you.”

“Of course I am in for Dinner. I don't see half as much of the two of you as I would like at the moment. So bet on me being there. It's my first free weekend for three months. I will do everything to make it worthwhile.”

Ginny caught her fiancée's glimpse and sighed.   
“Boys”, she muttered. “You think with your stomachs. Anyone who ever even considered you thought with any other body part was absolutely mistaken.”

She escaped his embrace and opened the oven door. A lovely smell wafted through the kitchen. 

“Yep, I guess that's done”, Ginny stated smiling. She was pretty proud of her cooking skills. Molly had always told her she was a hopeless case but anyone was a hopeless case when Molly Weasley was constantly fussing about them while they tried to prepare a meal.

“So, let's have some food and then we will see whether your brain works properly again afterwards. Hermione and Malfoy... outrageous thought.”


	2. Chapter 2

They had had a lovely dinner – Ginny had made Spanish Omelette which tasted fantastic – and were sitting in the living room together watching Quidditch on the television when the owl arrived. 

The use of Muggle televisions to watch Wizarding sport was of course against the law. But Ginny had inherited her dad's fascination with Muggle technology as well as his belief that “Misuse of Muggle Artifacts” started where said artifacts were either likely to fall into the wrong hands or to give away the fact that there were still wizards and witches in this world. Harry had not even pretended to be shocked when she had showed him the new invention that she called the “floo broadcast”. In his opinion it was due time that the Wizarding world opened their eyes to technology. But he also knew that it would take at least another decade before that belief had manifested itself in the heads of the Ministry officials. But that meant although Ginny's genius would not be known to the public any time soon, they could still privately enjoy its merits and see the Kenmare Kestrels beat the Montrose Magpies – or rather slaughter them. They had only been playing for thirty minutes and already three players were being treated for bad Bludger-induced injuries.

“They have quite impressive beaters”, Ginny said. “They only started flying for the Kestrels a couple of months ago. I'm kind of scared they will make mousse out of us when we have to play them.”

She was half curled up on the sofa, her head resting on Harry's shoulder whose left hand was absent mindedly playing with her long red hair.

“You'll just have to outwit them”, he said. “Shouldn't be too complicated. Their strategy is simple. Look, they always try to fork out, get the target in the middle and then... ouch that looked painful.”

Another Magpie had been catapulted out of her broom by two simultaneously fired Bludgers that had hit her in the stomach. The referee was shouting abuse at one of the beaters and had a fiery red face. But Kestrels keeper Owen caught each of the penalties. It was a disastrous match for the Magpies and a clear win for the Kestrels. Especially as the Magpie Seeker had been the first one to hit the ground after a bad foul in the fifth minute of the game.

Suddenly, Harry heard a sound that was not coming from the loudspeakers of the television. He turned his head. An owl was sitting on the windowsill and was klicking its beak against the glass. Harry frowned. Usually, the owls did not deliver after six in the evening. Then he saw the purple envelope it was carrying. A purple envelope with the seal of the Auror Office. A letter of utmost urgency. He jumped up, almost throwing his fiancée off the sofa, and hastily opened the window. No sooner had he untied the string around its foot and taken the letter that the owl flew off again. 

“What is it, Harry?”, Ginny asked pointing her wand at the screen to mute the sound. 

Harry broke the seal and tore open the envelope. The message it contained was brief but clear.

Emergency Alert! All Aurors have to report to the office immediately!

Harry sighed and handed the letter over to Ginny before getting his coat and shoes from the hallway.

“What can this be about?”, Ginny asked waving the letter.

Harry shrugged.

“Don't know. Sounds urgent, though.”

“I think you never got one of these before.”

“Not that I would remember. Things have been rather calm.”

“And now...?”

He shook his head.

“I really don't have an inkling what this is about. I guess I will find out in a minute. Don't wait up.”

He kissed her forehead before he went out of the door. Most of the ministry members used the floo network to get to work, but Harry still preferred his broom to any other means of transport. It took slightly longer, but some people needed longer to tie their shoelaces than Harry needed to cover the distance from Oxford to London on his Firebolt.

When he arrived, most of the department was already there, but Seamus was still missing. “Probably has already been ready for bed and needed to groom himself back into shape”, Ernie Macmillan murmured underneath his breath. Harry tried to hide his laughter in a cough. Ernie had been a bit pompous back in their school days but had grown up to be one of Harry's favourite colleagues. Whenever possible, he tried to be on duty together with him and Justin Finch Fletchley. It had been the three of them who had covered the Kensington Park incident earlier on.

It was Kingsley Shacklebolt himself who entered the room behind Gawain Robards the head of the Auror Office. The Minister of Magic looked deeply concerned. He let his eyes trail over the assembled wizards and frowned when he noticed there was one of them missing. Harry knew Kingsley to be a fair and honest man but also someone who did not like unpunctuality and disobedience. Seamus would have some explaining to do.

“Good to see you all”, Robards opened the assembly. He looked dishevelled, was wearing a track suit and trainers and had a dog leash in his hand that was attached to a tiny rat-like creature that could have been anything but hardly defined as a member of the canine species. If there had been any wolves in its ancestry, it had been a very long time ago. 

“So, we have a problem”, he continued while the animal on the leash began to sniff at everyone's shoes. “Kingsley will explain everything to you.”

Shacklebolt nodded and took a step forward.

“Potter, Finch Fletchley and Macmillan, you were in charge of the Kensington issue. Are you absolutely sure that all of the attackers were caught and safely transported to St Mungo's?”

The three of them exchanged a look and then nodded simultaneously.

“We did not see anyone else not did any of the witnesses report a fourth person being involved”, said Ernie. 

Kingsley sighed.

“Then”, he said slowly, “we have a huge problem at our hands. Mr Finnegan was on duty tonight and was attacked by an unknown wizard and is currently under the caring hands of Miss Granger at the hospital. He is unable to identify the attacker or make any sensible statement. As far as I was informed he has tried to get hold of both Miss Granger's and Mr Malfoy's wand and has behaved in a manner similar to that which was observed in the first three attackers. And he is not the only one. In the last three hours, Miss Granger has reported four more cases. I fear there might be more. We will have to double our forces and work long shifts until this is under control.”


	3. Chapter 3

Draco wiped the sweat off his forehead and leaned against the door he had just bolted shut. From the other side he could still hear Finnegan banging against it in a rage. He would never have expected that slender Irish bastard to be that strong when unleashed. He was pretty sure he would have bruises tomorrow. Well at least he would look badass. You didn't look badass often enough when you were a healer. 

“Tea?” 

Hermione was panting as well and her hair had escaped the tight knot she usually wore it in. They had both had to fight like lions to keep Seamus in check. This was becoming exhausting. After all, this had been the fifth case in less than a day. How many more would follow? Well the Ministry would have to send some bloody bouncers to help them out if this continued. Draco did not recall his work contract word by word but he was pretty sure it did not contain the words “combat”, “martial arts” or “Irish street fighting”. 

“I need something stronger than tea after this.”  
“I know what you mean. But we're still on duty.”  
“I wasn't talking about alcohol, Granger. Although I have to admit, the prospect of downing half a bottle of fire whisky and leaving you to face this menace on your own is enticing. I was talking about coffee. Black coffee, as strong as it gets. This is going to be a tough night, if I am not entirely mistaken. And I will need to be awake in case there are more cases coming in.”

Hermione nodded and got up. She fixed her hair on their way to the break room. Dracos gaze lingered on her slender, exposed neck for a second too long. He shook his head and winced. Hermione turned around.

“What's up?”  
“I think the Irish Bloodhound dislocated one of my vertebrae, at least it feels like it.”

With a determined movement she sat him down in the next best chair, before she turned around to get her wand out of her bra where she had stuffed it as soon as they had found out that the mere sight of these small pieces of wood drove the patients even wilder than they already were. 

Typically Granger. Always practical. He had stuffed his own wand down the back of his trousers – and had ignored his colleague's jokes about cursed-off butt-cheeks – but during the fight with Finnegan it had surfaced that this was not a safe place to store it. He contemplated sticking it in his sock and regretted he was not a man who wore knee highs. 

Hermione flicked the wand twice and a spoon jumped out of the drawer to shovel ground coffee into the filter that had unfolded itself and gracefully hovered above the coffee pot. At the same time, the kettle obediently flew to the sink and filled itself with water before settling down on the stove.

Draco thought how easy all of this looked. He knew that casting that many spells at once was not an easy task. You usually got parts wrong or you forgot bits or you did not concentrate enough and ended up with shattered pots or hot water fountains.

“So, let's have a look at your neck now”, Hermione said when she could be sure the coffee would be made satisfactory.

He felt her hands on his back and let her fingers walk up his spine vertebra by vertebra. He had to suppress a shudder and told himself he was an idiot. This was a health check. She was a colleague. A good colleague at that. He had never believed he would be able to work alongside Granger. But it had taken him a week – and it would have been less than that if he had not been sulking – to notice she was highly professional and did not let their past differences get in the way of their day job. 

What had started off as cold politeness had even turned into something like comradeship after a few months. Working in St Mungos meant facing the abysses of human failure. And you could only stare down into that abyss together for so long before you instinctively reached out for your neighbour's hand. 

Draco had to admit he liked Hermione's company. She was not only incredibly clever – he had known that for years – but she was also witty, funny and sometimes a bit reckless. He liked the reckless streak in her character. He could probably not have worked along someone who always followed the rules. Hermione did not break the rules though, she was only terribly good at bending them if need arose. Kicking Seamus in the crotch definitely bent the rules a fair bit, but if that discussion should ever come up, Hermione was sure to explain her behaviour with the simple truth that had she not applied that measure, Draco might have ended up with more than just a bleeding nose and a dislocated verte... 

“Ouch!”  
“Sorry bout that.”  
“You just pushed that vertebra back in with that Kung Fu trick, didn't you?”  
“I know, I should have warned you but people tense up when you tell them and it would only have been more painful.”  
“Hermione Granger, you are a witch, and a damned good one at that. You don't have to use Muggle methods if there are less painful magical alternatives!”

She looked embarrassed and Draco scolded himself in his head. His back felt much better already and did it really matter that she had done it manually instead of using her wand?

“I'm sorry, Granger”, he heard himself utter. “Didn't mean to be rude. I was just – slightly surprised.”

She shook her head and shrugged.

“I think the coffee's ready”, she murmured. 

He watched her take their favourite mugs from the shelf. Hers was a dark violet huge bucket that   
held about half a litre of liquid. His was much smaller and velvety black. He expected her to ask how he wanted his coffee but she proceeded without a word, filled her cup first and added a large quantity of milk to it, before she filled his mug and threw two pieces of sugar in, before she came back to the table and put both cups down on the stained wooden surface.

“What's it now, Malfoy?”  
“What is what?”  
“You're looking at me in a funny way and you're neither smiling, nor lifting an eyebrow nor doing the all-famous Malfoy-sneer, so what is it?”

He took a sip of the coffee. It was incredibly strong – no coffee for the faint-hearted - and just as sweet as it had to be. 

“You know how I like my coffee”, he tried to explain.

Hermione shrugged.

“I've been working alongside you for a couple of years now. I have seen you have coffee a million times. Of course I know, how you like your coffee.”

He didn't reply, but what he thought was: But most people would not know. Not even after years, not after decades. Because most people just don't take that kind of information in because they deem it irrelevant. He was just about to come up with a better reply than that – one that contained more arrogance – when the door to the ward flew open and Harry and Ernie entered carrying an unconscious wizard in their midst.

“Don't tell me it's another one with that strange curse!”, Draco said instead of a welcome. 

He did not need an answer. Potter was covered in blood – a look he had not sported much for a while but that had been quite popular in their schooldays and thus made him look younger in Draco's eyes than he actually was. Ernie was limping and had a black eye to show for his efforts as an Auror.

“Merlin!”, he heard Hermione's voice behind him. And then – a shriek, when the young witch realized who it was her best friend and his colleague were carrying.


End file.
